Link Centre Dictionary

muddy

US/ˈmʌdi/ fairly common informal literary
adjective (4) verb (3)

adjective

1.

(of soil) soft and watery

  • “the ground was boggy under foot”
  • “a marshy coastline”
  • “miry roads”
  • “wet mucky lowland”
  • “muddy barnyard”
  • “quaggy terrain”
  • “the sloughy edge of the pond”
  • “swampy bayous”
Synonyms
Similar
2.

dirty and messy; covered with mud or muck

  • “muddy boots”
  • “a mucky stable”
Synonyms
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3.

(of color) discolored by impurities; not bright and clear

  • “dirty”
  • “a dirty (or dingy) white”
  • “the muddied gray of the sea”
  • “muddy colors”
  • “dirty-green walls”
  • “dirty-blonde hair”
Synonyms
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4.

(of especially liquids) clouded as with sediment

  • “a cloudy liquid”
  • “muddy coffee”
  • “murky waters”
Synonyms
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verb

1.

dirty with mud

Synonyms
2.

cause to become muddy

  • “These data would have muddied the prediction”
3.

make turbid

  • “muddy the water”

Origin

The adjective is derived from Late Middle English muddi, moddy, muddy (“covered with or full of mud, muddy”), from mud, mudde (“mud; turbid water”) + -i (suffix forming adjectives). Mud, mudde is possibly borrowed from Middle Dutch modde, and/or Middle Low German modde, mudde, from Proto-Germanic *mud-, *mudra- (“mud”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *mū-, *mew- (“moist”). The English word is analysable as mud + -y (suffix meaning ‘having the quality of’ forming adjectives). Doublet of muddle. The verb is derived from the adjective. cognates * Middle Low German moddich, muddich (German Low German muddig (“muddy; mouldy”))

Phrases

  • Muddy Mississippi
  • muddy the water
  • muddy the waters
  • muddy up
  • Muddy York

Related words

Word family

Broader terms

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.